Malicious software is software that is designed to infiltrate or damage a computing system. Examples of malicious software include viruses, worms, trojans, and spyware. Often malicious software is embedded in what appears to be a legitimate software application. When a user downloads, installs, and/or executes the software application, they are additionally or instead inadvertently downloading, installing, and/or executing the malicious software.
For example, an interloper may infect the software code of a legitimate application available for download on a personal computer or a communication device. A user may then download and install the infected software application thinking that they are obtaining the legitimate version of the application. The malicious software in the application may then attempt to conceal itself and secretly perform damaging or unwanted activities ranging from corrupting and/or deleting files to displaying pop-up ads to collecting and sending information over a network.
As a specific example, a system administrator may permit users of wireless handheld devices to download a legitimate software application comprising a poker game that can be played on the device. An interloper may infect the software code of the poker game to embed spyware that collects GPS information on the location of the user's device and sends this information to the interloper over the wireless network. A user may then inadvertently download and install the infected version of the poker game application believing that they are downloading and installing the legitimate uninfected application. The infected poker game application may appear to operate as expected; however, unbeknownst to the user, the spyware infected in the application is collecting and transmitting the user's GPS information.
There is a desire to mitigate the effects of malicious software applications.